Tag: Jack in the Box

(Editor’s Note: It’s the final day of Salad Week here at The Impulsive Buy. It was an interesting week filled drive-thru windows, black plastic bowls with clear plastic covers, way too much iceberg lettuce, and a lot of salad tossing. Today’s final salad review comes from my favorite fast food place, Jack in the Box. Enjoy.)

Being Asian, I felt I had to represent and try the Asian Chicken Salad from Jack in the Box. However, I also had another reason for picking it up: I needed more Asian in me and I was hoping that this salad could give it to me.

You see, my ethnicity is Japanese, but I am probably the most un-Japanese Japanese person in the world. I can’t use chopsticks very well. I don’t like sushi. I definitely don’t karaoke. I remember six words from the two years of Japanese language I took in college (In case you were wondering, the six words are: Hai (yes), iie (no), sake (rice wine), sushi, karaoke, and geri (diarrhea).)

I don’t even think I have enough Asian in me to make the pick up line, “Do you have Asian in you? Would you like some?” work for me.

Although, I do drive a Toyota, which kind of makes me more Asian. But then again, just because Carrie Underwood won American Idol, doesn’t mean she’s very good, and also doesn’t mean Ruben Studdard can’t eat her.

Anyway, the Jack in the Box Asian Chicken Salad is a very colorful salad, as you can see in the picture above. It has green leaf lettuce, some fancy red/green leaf thing, baby spinach, red onion slices, shredded carrots, mandarin orange slices, pieces of grilled white meat chicken, wonton strips, roasted slivered almonds, Asian sesame dressing, and white-ass iceberg lettuce.

After I mixed the salad in a bigger bowl, I took a few bites of it using a fork and then switched to chopsticks to see if I had gained the Asian powers to wield them properly.

When several mandarin orange slices and leafs of lettuce ended up on the carpet, I knew the art of using chopsticks wasn’t meant to be. I guess my once fast fingers’ past as “The Human Vibrators” has messed up any chances of me using chopsticks properly.

The salad was very tasty, which was due to the very good Asian sesame dressing. I also liked the various textures the salad had. From the crunchiness of the wonton strips and almonds to the soft mandarin oranges and pieces of chicken. It’s probably the best fast food salad I’ve had so far, and I’m not being biased because I’m Asian.

Despite the 590 calories, 33 grams of fat, and 1306 milligrams of sodium, the Asian Chicken Salad is surprisingly the most healthiest specialty salad on the Jack in the Box menu. It also has a whole lot of potassium and dietary fiber, which are good for you.

After eating the entire salad, which was very filling, I realized that eating Asian foods won’t ever help make me more Asian.

So now I’ll take another approach and hopefully I can become more Asian by watching lots and lots of anime porn.

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Item: Jack in the Box Asian Chicken Salad
Purchase Price: $4.99
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Tasty. Good dressing. Lots of potassium and dietary fiber. The healthiest speciality salad on the Jack in the Box menu. Filling salad. Salad Week is over, which means back to REALLY unhealthy stuff.
Cons: Didn’t make me more Asian. High in sodium and fat. Abusing my fingers from those “Human Vibrator” years.

Oh Jack in the Box, when will you learn?

You can’t give your food items funny names without them getting teased. First it was Pannido? Now it’s Ciabatta? What are you trying to do, get them beat up?

Well, now that I think about it, it shouldn’t be so surprising coming from Crack in the Box…Oh, wait, I mean, Crap in the Box…I mean, Wack in the Box…

Anyway, here are a couple of examples of how poor Ciabatta could be teased:

Hakuna Ciabatta! What a wonderful phrase. Hakuna Ciabatta! Ain’t no passing craze. It means no worries for the rest of your days. It’s our problem-free philosophy. Hakuna Ciabatta!

Or someone could say, “Hey Ciabatta! Where’s Han Solo and the Millennium Falcon?”

If there’s anyone who knows what it’s like to have their name teased it would be me. For example, there’s Marvo the Retardo, Marvo the Bizzaro, Marvo the Lardo, Marvo the Farto…

STOP TEASING ME!!! LEAVE ME ALONE!!!

WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME!?!

STOP! STOP! I’M NOT CRYING!!!

NO, NO, NOT A WEDGIE!!!

AAAGH!!!

NO, THOSE AREN’T SKIDMARKS!!!

Oh sorry, I was having a schoolyard flashback.

Anyway, the Jack in the Box Classic Chicken Ciabatta is a new sandwich with a grilled chicken breast on a lightly toasted ciabatta bun with reduced fat herb mayo, sliced tomatoes, green leaf lettuce, and red onion slices.

Of course, the highlight of the sandwich is the Ciabatta, a bread with a crispy hard crust and a soft center, which is much like regular Italian bread and my pale body when it’s been out in the sun for too long.

Unfortunately, the Ciabatta bread didn’t add anything to the taste of the sandwich. Neither did the reduced fat herb mayo. At least it’s high in protein, which will help me build some muscles on my pale body.

It’s sure a whole lot easier than shooting steroids into my ass.

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Item: Jack in the Box Classic Chicken Ciabatta
Purchase Price: $5.79 (small combo)
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
Pros: Ciabatta bread was fluffy, like hair styles from the 1980s. High in protein.
Cons: Pricey. Ciabatta bread doesn’t add to the taste. Reduced herb mayo was bland. Easy name to make fun of. Hakuna Ciabatta!

When I first heard about it, I REALLY wanted to try the new Hardee’s Monster Thickburger, but there were two reasons why I didn’t:

1. There isn’t a Hardee’s anywhere here in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

2. I don’t think I have the balls to consume it. (Come on. 1,420 calories, 107 grams of fat, 229 milligrams of cholesterol, and 2,651 milligrams of sodium would scare many people and make vegans faint.)

Addicted Impulsive Buy reader Aymie asked if I was going to review it, however I told her the previously mentioned reasons why I couldn’t.

A few weeks later, another addicted Impulsive Buy reader, Aymie’s Mom (Who REALLY is Aymie’s mom) told me about her husband’s review of the Monster Thickburger.

I was instantly jealous of him.

Sure the best way I could try to outdo him was to combine two McDonald’s Big Macs, but if I did that I would still be short 200 calories, 40 grams of fat, 70 milligrams of cholesterol, and 600 milligrams of sodium.

You’ve won this battle TheShu, but if McDonald’s ever creates the Quadruple Big Mac, the war will be mine. Muahaha. Muahaha.

Well to help me overcome the sadness of not eating a Hardee’s Monster Thickburger, I decided to try the new Jack in the Box Chicken Cordon Blue Sandwich, with its chicken breast, Swiss cheese, and two slices of ham, in between toasted sourdough bread. (Sacre blu! I know, you French-heads. It should be cordon blu. Don’t yell at me, yell at Jack.)

Despite the plastic looking Swiss cheese (check out the picture), it was pretty good. Sure it’s ONLY got 555 calories, a paltry 28 grams of fat, a tiny 100 milligrams of cholesterol, and a modest 1335 milligrams of sodium, but I think it’s one of the tastier fast food chicken sandwiches I’ve had. It’s sure better than this one.

I wonder if Hardee’s will come out with a Monster Chicken Thickburger.

Item: Jack in the Box Chicken Cordon Blue Sandwich
Purchase Price: $5.79 (small combo)
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: No heart attack. Tasty. Ham. Sourdough bread.
Cons: Pricey. Not enough calories, fat, cholesterol, or sodium, or in other words, it’s not a Hardee’s Monster Thickburger. Name may upset the French.

I was first introduced to tryptophan by Mr. Claybaugh, my seventh grade history teacher. He told us about how turkey contains tryptophan, which is an amino acid that can make us sleepy. Mr. Claybaugh also told us that the only cure for overcoming the effects of tryptophan was to eat lots of pumpkin pie.

I don’t know if he was telling the truth or not.

Unfortunately, I haven’t really had a chance to prove it. Like most people at Thanksgiving, I always eat lots of turkey, mashed potatoes, ham, and yams. When dessert time rolls around, there isn’t much room for anything else, so I’ll only eat a slice of pumpkin pie, which probably isn’t enough to defeat the effects of tryptophan.

So before going on my trip to Las Vegas, I decided to find out the truth.

So I went to the national grocery store chain I shop at and looked for turkey. Unfortunately, finding a turkey right before Thanksgiving turned out to be a difficult task, because the store sold out. I thought about it for a few moments and a lightbulb popped into my head.

I walked to the deli counter to see if they had turkey and they did. I asked for a pound of turkey, which I received nicely sliced.

Now I that I had my turkey, all I needed was the pumpkin pie. Unfortunately, finding a pumpkin pie right before Thanksgiving also turned out to be a difficult task. Because it was almost Thanksgiving, I needed to order a pumpkin pie 24 hours in advance.

So instead of buying a pumpkin pie, I decided to pick up the new Jack in the Box Pumpkin Pie Shake, which is made with pumpkin-flavored ice cream seasoned with nutmeg and cinnamon. Close enough, right?

Now that I had my turkey and my “pumpkin pie,” the experiment could begin.

I ate the pound of turkey and then I tanked the medium-sized Pumpkin Pie Shake. The shake was really good and it tasted like pumpkin pie. Too bad Jack in the Box is only making these for a limited time.

After finishing off the Pumpkin Pie Shake, I sat in front of the television and watched the Tony Danza Show.

Minutes later I fell asleep.

After I woke up and wiped the drool from my face, I realized that maybe the Pumpkin Pie Shake wasn’t a good substitute for an actual pumpkin pie.

I also realized there are other things that will work much better to combat the effects of tryptophan and the Tony Danza Show. These include coffee, caffeine, and crack.

Item: Jack in the Box Pumpkin Pie Shake
Purchase Price: $2.29 (medium)
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Tastes like pumpkin pie. Surprisingly good. Don’t have to worry about pie crust.
Cons: Not a good replacement to overcome effects of tryptophan or the Tony Danza Show.

“Bigger and thicker” is how Jack in the Box is promoting their new Natural Cut Fries. I’m sure the same phrase has been used to promote other things. I won’t list them here, but I’ll let you use your imaginations…your dirty imaginations.

These new Natural Cut Fries replaces Jack in the Box’s previous fries, which honestly made me think, “This REALLY was a potato at some point?”

Jack in the Box is also promoting their Natural Cut Fries by saying they leave on the skin of the potato.

In case you didn’t know, the most nutrient part of a potato is the skin. However, when you cut up a potato with the skin and deep-fry it in extremely hot oil, the most nutrient part becomes the paper French Fry sleeve they come in.

After watching the Jack in the Box commercial on television, I was so looking forward to trying these fries.

I was thinking it was going to be like In-N-Out Burger fries, where they have some dude chopping up the potatoes in the kitchen, but then I remembered that this is crappy fast food and that the fries were probably chopped in some big factory, then flash frozen, then dumped into large brown bags, shipped across the United States in a 16-wheeler, and poured frozen out of the large brown bags into a waiting basket that will be dipped into a tub of boiling oil.

The Natural Cut Fries are bigger and thicker than Jack in the Box’s original fries and after trying them; I have to say they’re definitely better. However, their taste doesn’t stack up against the 800-pound gorilla of the French Fry world, McDonald’s French Fries.

I guess sometimes “bigger and thicker” doesn’t mean better.

Also, “average and I know how to use it,” always means better.

Right, ladies?

Item: Jack in the Box Natural Cut Fries
Purchase Price: $2.29
Rating: 2 out of 5
Pros: Potato skin!!! Bigger and thicker than Jack in the Box’s original fries.
Cons: Still doesn’t beat out McDonald’s fries in taste. Bigger and thicker, doesn’t mean better.